The government will this week come under renewed pressure to set a firm date for ending the individual worker’s right to opt out of the maximum average 48-hour week stipulated by EU law.
Finland, the current EU president, has summoned the 25 labour ministers for an extraordinary meeting on Tuesday in Brussels.
Its compromise proposal to revise the working time directive will be discussed, amid signs that European governments are desperate to settle a row that has dragged on for two years.
But Alistair Darling, trade and industry secretary, backed by UK firms, is resisting Finnish proposals demanding a “gradual” end to the opt-out and capping working hours within it at 60 in a single week instead of the current 78.
France, Italy and Spain, backed by unions, are lining up to force Britain to set a date for ending the opt-out which, according to John Monks, European TUC leader, is a “totemic” article of faith for both Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, his chancellor and likely successor. Mr Monks said the UK may no longer have enough support to block the proposed changes.
The Finns’ proposals for a settlement of one of the EU’s most divisive issues has been prompted by a European Court of Justice ruling that working time for doctors and nurses – and firefighters – embraces the hours spent “on call”. As many as 23 EU countries are in breach of this judgment from Europe’s highest court, which could force them to employ fewer doctors.
Mr Blair, who is being advised by the Foreign Office to accept the Finnish plan, has warned that his NHS reforms could be scuppered by this ruling as doctors are covered by the working time directive – a provision said to cost the NHS £250m a year.
Tarja Filatov, Finnish labour minister, has proposed that inactive “on-call” time should not be considered working time – and be compensated for by rest period within a reasonable period, rather than immediately as the court ruled.
But Mr Monks, in a letter to her, said “these provisions will leave the millions of on-call workers without any meaningful protection against very long and irregular working hours” and would exacerbate the already high drop-out rate of hospital staff.
The European TUC, backed by a majority of MEPs, wants stiffer rules to force companies and other employers to give their staff the right to demand changes to their hours and patterns of work.
It argues that, when an ageing Europe demands a longer working life, legislation should provide for a better balance between work and private life.
Mr Monks said: “For us this is about stress and other health-and-safety issues while for the government it’s a matter of liberty. For both Blair and Brown the directive is a ridiculous piece of European legislation which represents all that is worse about countries such as France.”
David Gow and Nicholas Watt in Brussels
Monday November 6, 2006
Guardian Unlimited